Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/22

18 I have never known what became of my sister, nor do I know how I came to fall into the hands of a man named Drake, having been too young at that time to remember now the causes of happenings then. However, I remained with this man, Drake, on his plantation near The Hermitage, the home of Gen. Andrew Jackson, until I was fifteen.

Drake was a bachelor who owned a large number of negro slaves, and I was brought up to the age mentioned among the negro children of the place, without schooling, but cuffed and knocked about more like a worthless puppy than as if I were a human child. I never saw the inside of a school-house, nor was I taught at home anything of value. Drake never even undertook to teach me the difference between good and evil, and my only associates were the little negro boys that belonged to Drake, or the neighbors. The only person who offered to control or correct me was an old negro woman, who so far from being the revered and beloved "Black Mammy," remembered with deep affection by many southern men and women, was simply a hideous black tyrant. She abused me shamefully, and I was punished by her not only for my own performances that displeased her, but for all the meanness done by the negro boys under her jurisdiction.

Naturally these negro boys quickly learned that they could escape punishment by falsely imputing to me all of their mischief and I was their scape-goat.

Often Drake's negro boys went over to General Jackson's plantation to play with the negro boys over there and I frequently accompanied them. One day the